SAVIOUR, ST.
385
SAVONAROLA
tread in his steps. They are his friends onl}' if they keep his commands and foHow his footsteps.
We must consider it proved that these three points or elements are the doctrine of the whole New Test. What is there about this teaching that has provoked in times past and present so much disputation? Not the hardness of the doctrine — for none of the theories put in its place are any easier — but its want of logical com- pleteness. Sketched out for us in a few broad lines, it tempts the fancy to fill it in and lend it color; and we do not always remember that the hands that attempt I his are trying to make a mystery into a theory, an in- j finite truth into a finite one, and to reduce the great things of(iod into the narrow limits of our little field of view. To whom was the ransom paid? What was Sa- tan's share of the transaction ? How can one suffer for another? How could the Redeemer be miserable when he was conscious that his work was one which could bring happiness to the whole human race? Yet this condition of indefiniteness is one which is imposed on us in the reception of every mystery. Prayer, the incarna- tion, tlie immortality of the soul, are all subjects that pass far beyond our range of thought. Here we see the wisdom of God in connecting so closely our redemption with our reformation. If the object were to give us a complete theory of salvation, no doubt there would be in the Bible much to seek. The theory is gathered by fragments out of many an exhortation and warning; no- where does it stand out entire, and without logical flaw. But if we assume that the New Test, is written for the guidance of sinful -hearts, we find a wonderful aptness for that particular end. Jesus is proclaimed as the sol- ace of our fears, as Xhe founder of our moral life, as the restorer of our lost relation with our Father. If he had a cross, there is a cross for us; if he pleased not himself, let us deny ourselves; if he suffered for sin, let us hate sin. And the question ought not to be, What do all these mysteries mean? but Are these thoughts really such as will serve to guide our life and to assuage our terrors in the hour of death ? • The answer is twofold — one from history and one from experience. The preach- ing of the cross of the Lord even in this simple fashion •converted the world. The same doctrine is now the ground of any definite hope that we find in ourselves of forgiveness of sins 'and of everlasting life. See Thom- son, essay on the " Death of Christ," in A ids to Faith.
Saviour, St., Ori>er of, a name applied to the Order of St. Bridget (q. v.), because it was pretended that our Saviour personally dictated to the founders the rules and constitution of the order. — Gardner, Faiths of the World, s. v.
Savonarola, Girolamo, an Italian monk, reform- er, and martyr, th^ leader of an incipient reformation of the Church in the latter half of the 15th century, a man whose eventful life and tragic death have called forth tlie most contradictory judgments, and whose real character is even to this day a matter of dis- pute with certain historians. Savonarola was bom of an honorable family at Ferrara, Sept. 21, 1452. His education was carefully conducted. It was intended that he should devote himself to natural and medical science, but his early religious development turned him into another course. He was fond of solitude, and avoided the public .walks of the ducal palace. Im- pressed with terror at tlie wickedness which he saw about him, he finally, in his twenty-third year, tied from his home and friends and took refuge in a Dominican, cloister at Bologna. Two days after his arrival in Bo- logna he wrote to his parents, begging their forgiveness and blessing, and averring as his excuse. that he was utterly unable to endure the spectacle of tlie wickedness of Italian society. He also declared that he had simply •followed out a divine impulse given him in prayer, and that he felt that he should be rea(ly to suffer anything, even death, rather than disobey the voice of duty.
At first Savonarola desired to be simplv a lay brother, IX.— B B
and to perform the commonest menial services; but his superior saw his gifts, and charged him from the start with the teaching of what was then called philosophy and phj'sics. His chief authorities in this teaching were the great Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas, the Church father St. Augustine, and, above all, the Holy Scriptures. The latter he knew almost by heart. He was particularly fond of the Old-Test, prophets and of the Apocalypse. It was in the study of these that his spiritual imagination nurtured itself, and attained such an intense vividness as to make it easy for him to assume to himself too much of the prophetic character. His first attempts at preaching were without special results. His voice was harsh, his gestures awkward, liis language clumsy and scholastic. His audience was not attracted. But, while on a visit to Brescia, his power broke forth suddenly, as waters from a pent-up fountain. The people flocked to him in great crowds to hear his imaginative exposition of the Apocalypse; and the impression was not lessened when he made definite inferences (" non per rivelazione, ma per ragione delle Scritture") as to calamities which were soon to fall upon Italy. But his politico-reformatory labors began only in his thirty-eighth year (1490), when he was appointed as lectoi- in the Dominican cloister of San Marco, Flor- ence. His two leading thoughts now were, reformation of the Church and emancipation of Italy. In carrj'ing out these, he shook to its foimdations the Florentine government, raised against himself the anathemas of the hierarchy, and finally fell himself a victim to the herculean task.